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There once was a golden age for EDA editorial. Seems funny to say nowadays, when we see EDA editorial in a virtual shambles…where one or two publications gamely soldier on as pure play editorial ventures…while others have adopted various sponsorship business models, thereby incurring the snide, not-accurate accusation of being pay-for-play vehicles.

Among the handful of first-tier publications back around the turn of the century, EE Times clearly was the go-to book for EDA. Staffed by a corps of editors who brought their sharp, keen-edged industry knowledge to their reporting, no EDA startup thought they launched themselves successfully without being covered in EE Times. And the formula worked for quite a while. I still remember how those 240 page tomes came to the mailbox each week.

There were two people who figured prominently in the EE Times braintrust.

Brian Fuller, as editor-in-chief, oversaw and created much of what was successful for the various sections that covered all of electronic design. And there wasRichard Goering, the longtime EDA editor with his imposing manner, startling industry knowledge and contacts. Richard was perhaps best known for refusing to allow canned presentations during interviews. He’d ask for material before the interview, then start off the interview with those famous words, “I’ve looked over your material and have a few questions,” and run the 30 -45 minute interview. It was a little like Steve Jobs saying, “Oh, and one more thing.”

EDA editorial has changed, needless to say. Fortunately, we have Fuller and Goering here to talk a little about what EDA editorial used to be, what it is today, and what we can look toward in the future. We’ll post their thoughts over the next several weeks, usually on a Monday.

I can’t think of any individuals more qualified to speak cogently on this subject.

Brian Fuller

Richard Goering

ED: Brian, Richard, thanks for taking time to reminisce a little and to analyze and speculate about where we’re at now. So let me kick it off with this question:

What’s happened to electronic design editorial and where is it today?

BRIAN: Ed, to your question what’s happened to electronic design editorial is pretty simple: it’s still there…it’s just in a different place.

ED: I keep referring to a golden age for EDA editorial. There was one, wasn’t there?

BRIAN: Yes, there was! Think back 20 years ago and you had at least three major publications with EDA editors of one type or another: EDN, Electronic Design, EE Times, Electronic News (not to mention overseas publications).

ED: There also was Computer Design, the first publication covering EDA to bite the dust.

BRIAN: That’s right!

ED: But I interrupted you…

BRIAN: EE Times, of which I am most familiar, had 2.5 editors at one point covering the design automation industry from the technology and business standpoint.

ED: So what happened?

BRIAN: Well, we all know the backstory since then: In 2001, the dot-com bubble burst. Semiconductor and EDA companies shifted marketing dollars to their own site development and to those publications they thought could deliver more eyeballs.

ED: What about the notion that EDA vendors never bought sufficient advertising and therefore killed their own editorial?

BRIAN: It wasn’t just with EDA, but I think EDA started the ball rolling, and they were big advertisers so the impact was significant. Electronics publications had to prioritize areas that they were going to cover. Paul Miller, then CEO of UBM Electronics, said pretty bluntly “EDA marketers: If you’re not going to support us, we can’t invest in editors.”

That was the end of Mike Santarini at EE Times; just a few years later it was the end of Richard Goering, now my colleague at Cadence.

RICHARD: Well, not really the “end” of Mike or myself; Mike went to Xilinx, and I’m now at Cadence. But I do agree with Brian that a lack of advertising revenues ended my career at EE Times.

ED: So what do we have today?

RICHARD: Not much is left in print. EE Times, EDN and Electronic Design still exist on-line, but in more of a blog format than traditional journalism. Their EDA coverage is limited.

BRIAN: Richard’s right. There isn’t an EDA “press corps” in the old definition of the term. The electronics publishing industry has restructured itself into smaller, more specialized sites with much lower overhead than the traditional electronics publishing houses, and they are quite healthy. Editors do cover EDA from various angles, but they also cover lithography and foundry and SoC design and so on.

These are outfits like SemiWiki, EE Journal and its sister publications, Semiconductor Engineering, Chip Design Magazineand so on.

Over this same period, those companies that shifted their marketing dollars away from third-party publishers to build out their own sites, realized they needed content experts, because that¹s never been their strength. So, as more editors have been turned out onto the streets from third-party publishing, industry companies have eagerly snapped them up to build content.

Right now, we have a very interesting mixture of editors working together from two sides of the aisle, if you will, to create technology conversations.

……………………..

So what is the EDA editorial braintrust these days? See what Richard and Brian have to say about it in our next blog.

Today we will hear from McKenzie Mortensen, of IPextreme, on print vs. digital.

McKenzie Mortensen

I’m far more on the fence about this topic than I ever thought I would be. In all honesty, I’m not completely sure where I stand. I’ll try to replicate my thought process below:

Pro Print

I’m a literature nerd in a very big way—BA English (Writing, Rhetoric, and Culture), MA Children’s Literature, life-long bookworm. I love books—the look, the feel, the smell, the different typefaces, the weight of a volume as I’m reading… it’s a sensory experience as much as it is an intellectual one. I have actually begun collecting antique hardcovers and rare picture books over the past couple of years. From hand bound antiques to glossy coffee table volumes, books are a form of art.

I suffer from a mild obsession with stationery and paper products in general, plus I am an avid paper-crafter. I love to scrapbook and make collages, and magazines often come in very handy for harvesting images. I love cutting up magazines and turning them into something new. I’ve done some really neat things with old book pages also (only from damaged volumes, of course—I could never kill a book without it being a humane death).

There are certain circumstances when I would not feel comfortable having a tablet with me. For example, when I’m going to the beach or hanging out by the pool, the last thing I want to take with me is my iPad. A cheap paperback or a magazine seems a better choice in a wet, sandy environment where damage is likely.

I have a lot of bookworm friends, and one of our favorite things to do is trade books. Until it’s possible to lend a book to a friend digitally, I will need print copies of my favorites so that I can share them with people I know will appreciate them.

Books come from bookstores and libraries, and if I could live in either one, I totally would. The atmosphere is simultaneously calming and invigorating to me, a heady blend of paper, ink, and curiosity.

Pro Digital

I thought I would always be firmly a print girl, but I run into problems when I travel; as a fairly quick reader, I usually need to take more than one book with me on a trip in order to ensure that I’ll have sufficient reading material. As you can imagine, my carryon bags have been rather weighty at times. I started using my iPad only for travel to avoid the 50-pound hand luggage problem.

The illuminated screen is great for reading under any light conditions without disturbing those around me (on a dark airplane, for instance).

I can download another book whenever I want to (well, provided I have Wi-Fi access). Simple!

I love that I can highlight passages and make notes easily as I read. You can take the girl out of literary academia, but you can’t take literary academia out of the girl, I guess! I developed a “study as you read” method during my education that I still apply to leisure reading. Such a nerd! Another bonus in this area is that I can easily explore allusions made in the text. I can look up dates and brush up on historical events, for example, as necessary. I can do all of these things when reading a print volume, but it’s not very practical when I’m on the go.

Reading magazines digitally affords me the huge benefit of “clickability.” If an article mentions a restaurant I’d like to try, I can instantly view their website and check out the menu. I can order products or seek more information without having to dog-ear a page and remember to look things up later.

I can bookmark things and save images with ease, and in a very compact amount of space. Like many crafty people, I suffer from a Pinterest addiction.

We old gen folks bemoan the passing of print, even though we (in truth) haven’t cared about print for a number of years – finding the true value being on the web. I think it’s more symbolic for us old folks than anything else.

In the wake of the closing of the print editions by UBM, we decided to follow up with the new gen EDA folks we interviewed last week to get their take on this turn of events.

First up is Hannah Watanabe, of Synopsys, with her thoughts on the news…..

Hannah Watanabe

My mind goes back and forth when it comes to the whole print versus digital media. Personally, when it comes to books, I prefer to have the print version. There is something about turning a page and being able to physically see and feel how many pages I have read and how many I have left. When I’m done with the book, I can put it on a shelf with all of the other books that I have read and feel a sense of accomplishment.

However, when it comes to magazines or monthly or quarterly publications, I much prefer to have access to a digital copy. Unlike books, which I tend to read at home with a cup of tea and a blanket, I find myself looking at magazines and other publications when I’m on the go. When I’m on the go (say waiting for a dentist appointment), I only have bits and pieces of time to read, so it is much nicer to have a digital version or a magazine or publication on my phone than the whole printed version shoved in my purse. So, in short, I think that it is a good and positive move on EE Time’s part to go completely digital. With the age of smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices, I’m sure that the electronic version has a much larger audience and reach. Of course, I do feel for those who are losing their jobs due to a complete migration to digital.